


Kissing It All Better

by Flantastic



Category: James Bond (Craig movies), James Bond (Movies)
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, Schmoop, Sickfic
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2017-03-16
Updated: 2017-03-16
Packaged: 2018-10-06 05:45:38
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,605
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/10327034
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Flantastic/pseuds/Flantastic
Summary: James visits a poorly Q.





	

**Author's Note:**

> I managed to get a cold and a sore throat less than two weeks after food poisoning so to cheer myself up I finished off a WIP.
> 
> I really need a Bond right about now...

**  
**

**  
**

James stepped down from the private Lear Jet and winked at the stewardess who’d flown with him from JFK.  She smiled back at him and he was struck for the second time by how pretty she was.  She was slim but had an ample bosom, long red hair and a great arse.  There was a time, not so long ago, when he’d most probably have flirted with her in an attempt to fuck her every which way on the eight hour flight back to Heathrow simply to relieve his boredom.  He still was more than prepared to shag anyone and everyone he needed to in order to get the job done - he’d lost count of the number of one night stands he’d had in service of Queen and country - but a chance encounter six months previously had altered his personal predilections somewhat.

On a rare day off (when James had actually felt like doing something other than drinking himself into oblivion or sleeping for twenty hours at a time) he had decided to take a run along the side of the River Thames.  It had been a cold autumnal morning and the air was bracing down by the water.  While passing the stalls that had set up at the South Bank he’d spotted Q.  His quartermaster had been browsing through a second hand book stall, reading the back of a guide book to holidaying in South Devon which had been written around the turn of the last century.  The damp in the early morning air had curled his hair and he looked impossibly young without his glasses on.  He’d worn a tatty old military jacket and a dark scarf which he’d wound high around his neck against the chill.  He was totally entranced by the book and a faint smiled curled his lips as he examined it.  A cardboard take-away cup rested in the crook of his elbow, apparently forgotten.

Walking to the parking structure where he’d been instructed to pick up a car, James remembered how he’d startled Q into dropping his half-drunk tea just by saying hello.  Somehow, after embarrassed laughter and apologies and a trip to a cafe for a replacement drink and then a pub for lunch, they’d ended up back at James’s flat; Q gloriously naked and splayed out, moaning as James fucked him to a blinding orgasm.

After the first time together, they quickly fell into an easy rhythm.  They were friends (or more accurately; work colleagues) with benefits who liked to get together to scratch an itch whenever James was in town.  Q had admitted he didn’t have time for relationships and James was happy with anything with a pulse when he fancied letting off a little steam.  It was convenient for both of them and it worked well.  Or that was what James had told himself.  He found just recently that he thought about Q constantly when he was away on missions...

James found the car where Q had said it would be and smiled as the door handle’s sensors recognised his fingerprints.  It was an Aston Martin Vanquish in sleek gunmetal grey. Clever Q.  James started the engine and listened to her purr before easing the car out of the parking space.  Once away of the airport he dialled Q’s personal office number on the hands free.  He was surprised when R answered but didn’t bother with small talk.

“Where’s Q?”

“And hello to you too OO7,” R stated blandly, “Q’s off sick.  He’s been full of cold for over three weeks.  Finally convinced the stubborn sod to go to Medical this morning when he lost his voice.  He’s signed off for a week.  He asked me to tell you to drop your equipment back here ‘before you sodding well disappear again’ – his words.”

James chuckled.

“I’ll wager they were.  No need for me to visit you I’m afraid, R, my radio was tossed out of the window of a speeding car in Brooklyn and my Walther is somewhere at the bottom of the Hudson.”

“What about your exploding pen?”

“I shoved it up someone’s arse.”

There was a pause.

“Dear God, I hope you’re joking.”

“Goodbye R.”

James chuckled to himself as he hung up and checked his watch.  He saw that it was only a little after 8pm.  On an impulse he turned at the next junction and headed for Q’s flat.  He wondered how poorly Q actually was and decided that he should visit him to see if he might fancy a quick fumble.  James had read somewhere that sex was a great cure for headaches.

Ten minutes later he pulled into the parking space next to Q’s battered Ford Sierra Sapphire and got out.  He patted the bonnet of the old car as he walked past it.  He didn’t understand the sentimentality that Q had for it but he kind of liked it.  His love of old things certainly explained his current obsession with James, he thought.  He let himself into the foyer of the block of flats and waved a hello to the porter; a balding stocky fellow called Brian.  To the untrained eye he looked like the kind of gone to seed ex-army security guard that were two-a-penny in the city however James knew that Brian was ex-Special Forces, armed to the hilt and probably more than capable of giving the agent himself a run for his money.  The flats were for MI6 employees only and Her Majesty’s Government looked after their own.

James took the lift to the top floor and walked straight to Q’s door.  He rapped on it twice.

Nothing.

He looked to the small light on the smoke alarm above him.  A winking LED would indicate that the silent alarm within the flat had been tripped.

Nothing.

He knocked the door again.

Nothing.

Just as James’s concern was morphing into a cold, calculating professionalism and his hand was reaching for the gun he was still carrying, he heard movement behind the door.

“I swear to God Brian, if that’s you again…”

The door swung open and James was greeted by the sight of his dishevelled quartermaster, tousled-haired and wrapped in a duvet.  One side of his face was red and James felt a momentary pang of regret at having so obviously woken him.

“What do you want?”

James raised an eyebrow and turned on his most charming smile.

“Fancy a shag?”

Q stared at him for several long seconds.

“Fuck off James.”

He turned and went back into his flat, swinging the door closed behind him as he went.  James caught it easily and followed him in.  The lounge he found himself in was dark, lit only by a laptop screen, and it was a mess.  Tissues and packets of throat lozenges littered the coffee table alongside an open box of what looked like aspirin.  Several mugs of cold tea sat half-finished amongst the detritus like a fleet of Daleks who’d set off to conquer Q before realising halfway across the table that they couldn’t be arsed.  Q flopped down onto the sofa, pulling the duvet around himself and scowling.  He repeated his question;

“What do you want?  And before you answer, please be informed that I’m really not in the mood to cope with your particular brand of ‘humour’ right now.”

James winced when he realised how quiet and rough Q’s voice sounded.  He sat down next to him.

“R said you were ill.”

“R was right.”

James eyed the table.

“Well, with that many used tissues it had to be either that or I’ve interrupted you masturbating your way through a Sex and the City marathon.”

Q huffed out a quiet croaky laugh at that.

“Doctor Conroy thinks it's just a heavy cold but it’s aggravated my tonsils and… hang on a minute.  Sex and the City?  Why on earth would I be wanking off to Sex and the City?  Unless you failed to notice all those times you stuck your cock up my arse, I am gay.  I’m hardly one to beat off to that lot.”

James shrugged.

“I always thought Carrie was very butch… you’re always saying how much you love _my_ muscular arms...”

Q goggled at him before bursting into laughter.  Or he would have done had his throat not betrayed him, causing him to cough violently.

“Oh fuck…” he gasped between hacks, “oh fuck me…”

James quickly went to the kitchenette at the side of the room and poured a glass of water.  He went back to Q and placed it on the table in front of him.  He rested one hand on Q’s knee (or where he assumed his knee was – it was difficult to tell under the duvet) and placed the other on his back, rubbing soothing circles between his shoulder blades.  The coughing slowly petered out but James was alarmed to hear a thin wheeze rattle in Q’s breath.

“Please, James.  In the bedroom.  My blue inhaler…”

He jumped up again and went to the bedroom where he saw a Salbutamol inhaler on the bedside table.  He grabbed it and took it to Q, resuming his previous position as the Q took a deep draw on the little aerosol.  He stripped off the duvet and ran a shuddering hand through his hair.

“Oh fuck me.  I’m fucking boiling now.”

James realised for the first time that Q was still wearing his usual work clothes.  He watched as he tiredly peeled off his hideous mustard-coloured cardigan and dropped it onto the floor.  James felt a coil of concern unravel in his gut as Q dropped his head into his hands.  He didn’t look up when he spoke;

“I feel crap and I won’t be much company tonight I’m afraid James.  Can you show yourself out please?”

“No.”

Q looked up in surprise as James slung his arm around his shoulders and kissed his temple, wincing at the burn of fever that met his lips.

“You look like shit.  You need a warm bath and then a good night’s sleep.  I wouldn’t leave a dog like this Q.”

He huffed out a laugh and smiled a pale, thin smile, leaning into James’s one-armed hug.

“I might’ve known.”

“Hmm?”

“Bloody knight in shining armour.”

They stayed there for several minutes as Q’s inhalers took effect and his breathing eased before James began to suspect that Q might be dozing off. He shook him gently and smiled into his sleepy face.

“Come on.  Let’s get you sorted out.”

He extricated Q from the duvet and led him to the bathroom.  Sitting him down on the lid of the toilet, he checked that he was steady and not likely to slide off before turning on the taps to fill the bath.  Careful not to make it too warm he busied himself getting towels from the airing cupboard while Q struggled out of his clothes.  He removed his glasses and set them aside.  Once the tub was full he guided Q into the water who laid down and sighed.

“This is nice.”

James threw a flannel at him causing him to open his eyes blearily.

“No sleeping.  Wash.  Then bed.”

He left the room and hunted out some clean bedding.  Getting the duvet from the lounge he eyed the table.  Tidying up could wait but he grabbed the glass of water along with the box of tissues, Q’s inhaler and the lozenges and took it all into the bedroom.  He went to the bedside table’s drawer and took out the packet of paracetamol that he remembered seeing there last time he’d been scrabbling through it for lube.  He made short work of remaking the bed before going back to the bathroom to check that Q hadn’t drowned.

He was exactly where he’d left him.  His head had rolled to one side as he snored gently.  He looked exhausted with dark shadows under his eyes.  His wide expressive mouth was lax and his features were smooth.  He clutched the washcloth to his thin chest with one hand and the other lay across his stomach.  James’s eyes were drawn to his cock which was lying across his abdomen, nestling in a shock of thick, dark hair that contrasted starkly with his paleness.  For such a slight man he was surprisingly well hung, even flaccid as he was now.  He looked like some kind of ancient Greek artist’s dream.  Beautiful and fragile, all angular bones and smooth skin.  So trusting to be lying asleep naked and exposed in the presence of another.  James’s heart seemed to swell as he realised how much he wanted this; he wanted Q and not just for sex.  He wanted to wake up next to him every day.  He wanted to come home to him every night.  He wanted to possess this impetuous, brilliant, bloody-minded genius.  He wanted to make him happy, console him, pleasure him, laugh with him and care for him.   

James shook himself out of his reverie and into action, shocked by his chain of thought.  Q wasn’t the first man he’d seen naked and he most certainly wouldn’t be the last.  In his line of work that was a given.  He tried to force down the emotions that threatened to overwhelm him.  He had a moment of fear that this, right here, was all too much and so much more than an old war dog like him could ever hope to deserve.   He grabbed Q’s shoulder, shaking him a little more roughly than he’d intended.

“Q. Wake up.”

He jerked awake, momentarily disorientated.

“Wh...?  Mmmm… James.” He started to ineffectually rub his chest with the cloth. “I…  I was washing…”

James chuckled and took the shampoo down off the caddy.

“You were sleeping.  Honestly, I can’t leave you alone for five minutes.”

James gently took the cloth from him as he knelt next to the bath.  He encouraged Q to lie back, soaking his hair.  Squeezing some of the shampoo onto his hand he massaged it into the wet mop.  He ignored Q’s attempts to move away and wash it himself.

“Mmm not a child…”

“It’d be a bit dodgy if you were, what with all the times I’ve fucked you…”

Q huffed in amusement and stopped wriggling, sitting still as James’s fingers found the tension at the base of his skull and worked their magic.  He lay back into the water once more obediently, allowing him to rinse out the bubbles.

“How are you feeling?”

“Knackered.  I haven’t slept properly all week.  Too busy monitoring some arse in New York…”

James laughed again.

“You’ll sleep well tonight.  I hear the arse came home.”

Q didn’t answer and just watched James owlishly as he picked up the cloth once more.  He lathered it up and picked up Q’s skinny right arm by the wrist.  He began to wash it, wondering briefly about the wave of emotion he was feeling and at his choice of words.  Home?  Was he really starting to consider this grotty flat to be his home?  He felt he could relax more here than anywhere else but he’d always put that down to the tight security in the building rather than the company he kept. Once done, he picked up the other arm and repeated his actions.  When he began to rub Q’s chest the young man made a deep noise of satisfaction.  His head lolled to the side again extending his long neck and James swallowed down the urge to lick a stripe up it and instead smoothed the sudsy flannel over his delicate throat.

“Feels good.”

James efficiently washed his shoulders and chest and then went to run the cloth down over Q’s belly.  He seemed to rouse at James’s touch.

“What?  No James please.  Not now.”

James stopped what he was doing.

“What do you mean?”

Q started to look uncomfortable and held James’s wrist.

“I can’t,” He whispered, suddenly sitting up.  He looked embarrassed.  “I know… I know we usually fuck but I can’t tonight.  I just feel so dreadful…”

James stared at him like he’d grown an extra head and sat back on his heels.

“You seriously think I want to fuck you.”  He said flatly.  “Why would you think that?”

Q hesitated, looking more uncomfortable by the second.

“That’s what we do.”

James tilted his head, his eyes softening.

“You think that’s the only reason I come here?  Just so we can shag?”  Q nodded.  James knelt up and shuffled forward until he was pressed against the side of the bath.  He tossed the flannel into the water and gently cupped Q’s jaw.  “Q, why do you think it is that I keep coming back here exactly?”

Q shrugged.

“I don’t know.  I thought maybe you liked shagging me because I was normal.  I thought that maybe you fancied a change from all the beautiful women that you go to the bed with when you’re on mission.  You like me because I’m ordinary… A bit boring.”

James ran his thumb over Q’s cheek.

“I don’t think you’re boring at all.” He said softly, “I come here because of all the people I’ve slept with you are the most beautiful.  The most extraordinary.  When I’m in the field seducing a mark, when I need to get it up, it’s you I think about.  When I come back to London, it’s you I want to see.  Last time I was here, do you remember?  That Sunday afternoon we spent watching the telly?  That’s what I love.  That’s what I look forward to.  I…”  He hesitated and a combination of expressions washed over the young man’s face.  It was confusion closely followed by realisation and a hopeful smile. “Oh sweetheart.” He lamented. “Am I really so bad at this?  Have I been coming here all this time and not told you – not made you realise – how much I adore you?”  He raised one of Q’s trembling hands to his lips and kissed his knuckles.  “I really do.”

James suddenly realised it was all too much for Q.  He was exhausted.  Worn out.  He’d been ill for too long, under the weather for almost a month.  He looked overwhelmed, almost close to tears, by James’s simple confession.  To help Q, James tried to break the mood by pulling the plug out of the bath and grabbing his hands.  He gently tugged him up onto his feet and out of the bath.  Q staggered as he stepped down but James was there ready to envelop him in a towel, to hold him and pat him dry.  Q rested his head on his shoulder for a moment as James towelled his hair. They hugged briefly before he turned wearily to the sink to clean his teeth.  Once done, James led him to the bed and, giving him a couple of paracetamol for his temperature, guided him, still naked, in between the clean sheets.  Q sank down into the pillow gratefully.

“Will you stay?”

“I thought you didn’t want me to?”

“That was before.  I want you to stay now.”

“Then I’ll stay.”

It still wasn’t ten o’clock but jet lag was a bitch so James stripped and used the bathroom himself before sliding into the bed behind Q.  He instantly pushed himself back into James’s arms and tugged on his hands, wrapping them around his body.

“Thank you.  For looking after me tonight.”

James squeezed Q and kissed the side of his neck in acknowledgement.  The young man hummed in sleepy approval and shifted so that James could kiss the warm, tender stretch of his sore throat again.  With a smile James began to mouth at Q’s neck gently, kissing and soothing every inch of it, making sure to nuzzle up under the line of his jaw.  Q ran his fingers up into James’s hair as he  pushed up onto his elbow so he could press soft kisses into the crook of his shoulder before running his tongue over his adam’s apple.  He kissed his prominent collar bone and wondered if he should offer to blow him.  A nice slow orgasm might’ve helped him to sleep but when he looked up he realised that Q was dozing already so James went back to placing feather-light kisses down the length of his neck.

When he was sure that Q was more asleep than awake, James settled down beside him again, pressing their bodies together so that as much of their bare skin as possible was touching.  He closed his eyes as Q moved his hand to rest it over his heart.

James felt the soothing rhythm of it beating lull him and his mind drifted, smiling at the memory of Q dozing in the bath.  He breathed a sigh of contentment as he let more memories crowd him.  Q standing at his workstation drinking out of his Scrabble mug, Q stretched out beneath him writhing with pleasure, Q sitting watching some ridiculous science fiction show on the TV with his bare feet tucked up beneath him and of Q standing on the South Bank with an old book in his hand.  His mind’s eye skimmed over a dozen different images but always, _always_ , it drifted back to that moment.  The first moment in so many ways.  As James tumbled towards sleep he realised that at some point since arriving at Q’s flat something he maybe should have seen a long time before had become clear and that now he considered the way he felt about Q there was no way to deny his feelings.

He fell asleep holding on tightly to the man he loved.

**Author's Note:**

> As always, if you'd like to join me, I'm still doing my thing over at iambid.tumblr.com. Flailing over cute kitties, hot actors and men who, in all likelihood, are displaying a bit more flesh than their mothers would approve of.


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